Punters bet £1.2bn last year on black market site MyStake, report claims

Summary

A GAMRS investigation finds British consumers wagered roughly £1.2bn on unlicensed site MyStake in the past year, part of an estimated £3.51bn turnover across platforms run by Santeda International B.V. The report says about 64% of revenue comes from the UK and accuses MyStake and sister sites of deliberately targeting UK players, including Gamstop self-excluded users, using aggressive retention tactics and weak operational controls.

GAMRS collected payment records, customer-service transcripts and gameplay data, revealing patterns of refusal to honour self-exclusion, frequent cross-migration between sister sites, and marketing via affiliates and streamers using non-withdrawable playing funds. The report flags technical indicators of unlicensed operation, domain hopping across offshore hosts, and the possible use of an AI-generated persona to mask ownership.

Key Points

GAMRS estimates UK consumers wagered about £1.2bn on MyStake in the past year; the Santeda network’s annual turnover is estimated at £3.51bn.
Approximately 64% of the network’s revenue is believed to come from UK players; GAMRS estimates around £2.02bn is deposited annually by British consumers across Santeda sites.
MyStake operates without a UK Gambling Commission licence and is accused of targeting Gamstop self-excluded users via an affiliate network.
Evidence from 96 UK respondents showed combined verified losses of £241,152; average spend per respondent was £2,512 over 29 days.
Related sites (Goldenbet, Rolletto, Velobet, Freshbet) share technical fingerprints like identical Google Tag Manager IDs, suggesting a coordinated network.
Affiliates and streamers are reportedly given risk-free playing funds to normalise gambling and recruit depositors on platforms such as TikTok, Instagram and Twitch.
Technical findings include Mail.ru email use, weak authentication, repeated offshore hosting migrations and attempts to obscure ownership (including an alleged AI avatar named “Andres Markou”).

Context and relevance

This investigation lands amid renewed UK regulator activity against unlicensed operators. The findings matter to regulators, operators, harm-prevention groups and payment firms because they highlight how self-exclusion schemes can be undermined, how affiliates and streaming amplify risk, and how black-market operators use technical and opaque ownership tactics to evade enforcement. If true, the scale of UK customer losses and cross-site retention tactics increase the urgency for coordinated enforcement and payment-blocking measures.

Why should I read this?

Short and blunt — this is where real consumer harm is happening. If you care about regulation, player safety, payments or affiliate risk, GAMRS’ findings show how big the black market is and the tricks it uses (streamers, fake execs, site-hopping). We’ve done the skimming — read this so you know whether to act, escalate or change processes.